Ecclesiasticus 17

¹God created man of the earth, and after his own image he made him.

²And again he turned him into it, and conformable to himself clothed him with strength.

³He gave him a number of days and time, and gave him power of those things that are upon the earth.

⁴He put his fear over all flesh, and he had dominion of beasts and fowls.

⁵He created of him an helper like to himself: he gave them counsel, and tongue, and eyes, & ears, and heart to devise: and he filled them with the discipline of understanding.

⁶He created in them the knowledge of the spirit, he filled their heart with understanding, and evil and good he shewed them.

⁷He set his eye upon their hearts to shew them the great things of his works:

⁸that they might praise the name of sanctification: & glory in his marvelous works, that they might declare the glorious things of his works.

⁹He added discipline unto them, and made them inherit the law of life.

¹⁰He made an everlasting testament with them, & he shewed them justice and his judgements.

¹¹And their eye saw the glorious things of his honour, & their ears heard the honour of his voice, and he said to them: Beware of every unjust thing.

¹²And he gave them commandment every one concerning his neighbour.

¹³Their ways are before him always, they are not hid from his eyes.

¹⁴Over every nation he appointed a ruler.

¹⁵And Israel was made the manifest portion of God.

¹⁶And all their works as the sun in the sight of God: and his eyes without intermission looking on their ways.

¹⁷The testaments were not hid by their iniquity, and all their iniquities are in the sight of God.

¹⁸The alms of a man is as a seal with him, and shall preserve the grace of a man as the apple of the eye:

¹⁹And afterward he shall arise, and shall render them reward, to every one upon their head, and shall turn into the inner parts of the earth.

²⁰But to the penitent he hath given the way of justice, and he hath confirmed them that fail to sustain, and hath appointed to them the lot of truth.

²¹Turn to our Lord, and forsake thy sins:

²²pray before the face of our Lord, and diminish offences.

²³Return to our Lord, & turn away from thine injustice, and hate exceedingly abomination:

²⁴and know the justices and judgments of God, and stand in the lot of thy purpose, and of prayer of the most high God.

²⁵Go into the parts of the holy world, with the living, and them that give praise to God.

²⁶Tarry not in the error of the impious, before death confess. From the dead as nothing, confession perisheth.

²⁷Thou shalt confess living, alive and in health thou shalt confess, and shalt praise God, and shalt glory in his mercies.

²⁸How great is the mercy of our Lord, and his propitiation to them that turn to him!

²⁹For all things cannot be in men, because the son of man is not immortal, and they have delighted in the vanity of malice.

³⁰What is brighter than the sun? & it shall fail. Or what more wicked than that which flesh and blood hath invented? And this shall be reproved.

³¹He beholdeth the power of the height of heaven: and all men be earth and ashes.